May 14 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Supreme Court bolstered
Monsanto Co.’s ability to control the use of its genetically
modified seeds, ruling that companies can block efforts to
circumvent patents on self-replicating technologies.

The justices unanimously upheld an $84,456 award Monsanto
won in a lawsuit against Vernon Hugh Bowman, an Indiana farmer.
Rather than buying herbicide-resistant soybean seeds from a
Monsanto-authorized dealer, Bowman used harvested soybeans
containing the technology to plant his crops.

“Bowman planted Monsanto’s patented soybeans solely to
make and market replicas of them, thus depriving the company of
the reward patent law provides for the sale of each article,”
Justice Elena Kagan wrote for the court.

The case may affect makers of live vaccines, genetically
modified salmon, and bacteria strains used in medical research,
potentially helping makers of those products restrict use beyond
the first generation. Even so, the court said its ruling was a
narrow one that didn’t resolve all issues concerning patents on
self-replicating technologies.

“We recognize that such inventions are becoming ever more
prevalent, complex and diverse,” Kagan wrote. “In another
case, the article’s self-replication might occur outside the
purchaser’s control. Or it might be a necessary but incidental
step in using the item for another purpose.”

The case centered on a technology that has helped make
Monsanto the world’s largest seed company, with $14.7 billion in
annual revenue, as well as a prime target for opponents of
genetically modified food.

St. Louis-based Monsanto inserts genes into crops, letting
them withstand application of the herbicide Roundup. Farmers who
buy so-called Roundup Ready seeds must accept restrictions on
their use, agreeing not to save the harvest for planting in a
later season.

Yesterday’s ruling “reflects the court’s sensitivity to
the importance of patent protection not only for agriculture
companies such as Monsanto, but for the basic incentive
structure the patent system provides for innovation,” the
company said in a statement.

Bowman’s lawyer, Mark Walters, said in an e-mail that the
ruling “makes infringers out of 95 percent of America’s
soybeans farmers, dependent on the grace of a single company to
avoid liability.”

Monsanto said before the ruling that a loss would force the
seed industry to shift research away from soybeans, canola and
wheat -- crops that produce exact replicas of themselves because
they are self-pollinating. Grain from hybrid crops such as corn
isn’t typically replanted because the offspring are less
productive.

Nike LeBrons to NFL Helmets Protecting Edges in Patent Lawsuits

Nike Inc. is designing golf clubs with data-collecting
sensors to help perfect a swing. Its LeBron X+ basketball shoes
can measure vertical leap.

No longer are sporting-goods makers relying just on the
allure of a star athlete or a colorful design to sell athletic
wear and equipment. As they build in technology to sell
performance and safety advantages, they’re encountering the same
sorts of legal challenges to their features as makers of
smartphones and medical devices have.

Patent-infringement lawsuits were filed this year against
Beaverton, Oregon-based Nike over its FuelBand monitor, through
which users download heart rates and other data to a smartphone
application, and its Hyperdunk+ and LeBron X+ shoes, the latter
named for the Miami Heat’s LeBron James.

The litigation promises to be expensive -- patent cases
with more than $25 million at stake cost $5 million on average,
according to the American Intellectual Property Law Association
-- and could determine winners in the growing market.

“You have a relatively small industry, with a relatively
few number of players and incredibly competitive companies,”
attorney Brian Rosenthal of Mayer Brown in Washington. “Every
time there’s a technological advance, everyone wants to be
number one.”

Gadgets that combine electronics with athletic equipment
are the fastest growing segment of the so-called wearable device
market, which also includes Google Inc.’s Google Glasses,
according to Juniper Research, based in Hampshire, England. The
market is projected to grow from about $800 million this year to
$1.5 billion in 2014, said Nitin Bhas, a researcher with Juniper
in London.

Nike isn’t the only sporting-goods maker sued over its
innovations, and the sector could be the next big patent
battleground after the smartphone litigation tying up Apple
Inc., Google Inc.’s Motorola unit, Samsung Electronics Co. and
other technology companies.

SportBrain Inc., an Austin, Texas-based company that sells
pedometers, sued Herzogenaurach, Germany-based Adidas and Fitbit
Inc. over their activity monitors.

Easton-Bell Sports Inc.’s Riddell unit, the official maker
of helmets for the National Football League, is accused of
infringing a Colorado company’s patents for headgear that
measures the impact of a tackle or other blow and transmits it
to a wireless device.

Electronics companies including Samsung and Royal Philips
NV. are also obtaining fitness patents, said David Cornwell, a
lawyer with Sterne Kessler in Washington whose clients include
Adidas.

“I’m seeing a lot of companies that I wouldn’t expect for
sports electronics,” Cornwell said.

Nintendo Wins Appeals Court Ruling Over Video Game Systems

Nintendo Co. won an appeals court ruling that prevents a
patent-licensing company from trying to block imports of its Wii
gaming system into the U.S.

Motiva LLC, which had claimed Nintendo infringed its
patents, didn’t meet the requirements that would let it file a
complaint with the U.S. International Trade Commission, the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit said in a decision
posted on its website.

The case is Motiva LLC v. ITC, 12-1252, U.S. Court of
Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

For more patent news, click here.

Trademark

BCBG Wins Court Order Barring Knockoffs of Leger Bandage Dresses

BCBG Max Azria Group Inc. won a court order barring a
competitor from creating and selling knock-off versions of the
Herve Leger “bandage dress.”

Vernon, California-based BCBG acquired the Leger brand in
1998. Leger was already famous for the design of the bandage
dress, made from bands of fabric that form a tight-fitting dress
that “accentuates the female form,” the company said in its
court papers.

These dresses are popular with celebrities and won an award
for the company during the Fall/Winter 2011 Mercedes-Benz
Fashion Week in New York, according to the complaint.

The company said the dresses are sold in department stores
such as Nordstrom Inc. and the Intermix boutique. According to
the Leger website, the dresses sell for $900 to $1,600.

In the complaint filed in March 2012 in federal court in
Los Angeles, BCBG claimed that Los Angeles-based Stretta Moda
LLC was making and selling illegal copies of the bandage dress.
Further, BCBG said, Stretta was “leaking” to the public a
claim that its garments were made in the same factories as the
Leger bandage dress.

The dresses were so similar looking, BCBG said, that
customers have even tried to “return” Stretta merchandise to
Leger.

BCBG had asked the court for money damages and an order
barring further infringement.

In a consent order filed in April, Stretta agreed to pay
$150,000 to BCBG. Additionally, the company agreed to quit
making, importing or selling knockoffs, including but not
limited to 37 specific dresses listed in the order.

Both sides were to pay their own litigation costs and
attorney fees.

The case is BCBG Max Azria Group Inc. v. Stretta Moda LLC,
2:12-cv-02088-ABC-JCG, U.S. District Court, Central District of
California (Los Angeles).

For more trademark news, click here.

Copyright

Deutsche Boerse Unit Spurned by Top U.S. Court on Index Options

A Deutsche Boerse AG unit lost a U.S. Supreme Court appeal
that sought the right to offer options based on the Standard &
Poor’s 500 Index and the Dow Jones Industrial Average.

The justices yesterday turned away an appeal by Deutsche
Boerse’s International Securities Exchange LLC of a court order
that barred the company from creating a market for the options
without a license. Deutsche Boerse is the operator of the
Frankfurt stock exchange.

Canadian Anti-Piracy Firm Gathers 1 Million Evidence Files

Canipre, a Montreal-based intellectual property enforcement
company, says that after monitoring the downloading of pirated
content in Canada for several months, it has gathered more than
one million evidence files, the National Post reported.

The company said it has already provided evidence to one
client -- Los Angeles-based Voltage Pictures, maker of the
“Hurt Locker” film -- which is pursuing alleged infringers in
Canadian federal court in Toronto, according to the newspaper.

The Canadian ISP Teksavvy, which is on the other side of
the case, could potentially be ordered by the court to release
customer information tied to the Internet protocol addresses
identified by Canipre, the Post reported.

Barry Logan, managing director of Canipre, told the
National Post that his company has a “long list” of clients
who are willing to file infringement suits based on his data.

For more copyright news, click here.

Trade Secrets/Industrial Espionage

MIT Can Withhold Names in Swartz Suicide Probe, Court Rules

Massachusetts Institute of Technology doesn’t have to
disclose names of professors and law enforcement agents when it
releases documents related to the case of Aaron Swartz, who
committed suicide while awaiting trial on charges of stealing
electronic files.

U.S. District Judge Nathaniel Gorton said the names of the
MIT professors and agents in documents to be produced for public
viewing could be concealed to protect them from harm, according
to a filing in Boston yesterday.

“The estate’s interest in disclosing the identity of
individuals named in the production, as it relates to enhancing
the public’s understanding of the investigation and prosecution
of Mr. Swartz, is substantially outweighed by the interest of
the government and the victims in shielding their employees from
potential retaliation,” Gorton said in his order.

Swartz was arrested in 2011 and charged with unlawfully
entering MIT’s computer network and downloading more than 4
million articles and documents from journals and distributing
them for free.

Facing a possible sentence of 30 years if convicted, the
26-year-old hanged himself in his Brooklyn apartment last year.
His family blamed the university and U.S. prosecutors for his
death and sought to have the documents released without
omissions.

The criminal case was U.S. v. Swartz, 1:11-cr-10260, U.S.
District Court, District of Massachusetts (Boston).